All Stars FC head coach Sinethemba Badela admits he’s love to retain Thabiso Sesane but the ball is in the court of Orlando Pirates.
Sesane made his debut for Pirates as a teenager during the Milutin Sredojević, Rulani Mokwena era but found it hard to establish himself into the first eleven.
The 22-year-old has since made two separate loan spells in the second tier with Jomo Cosmos and now All Stars, ironically under Mokwena’s protege from Back Poison, Badela.
“Sesane, we have to be very careful with him, he’s a young boy and he will make mistakes and all that, but he’s been doing well, he’s growing each and every game because he’s humble,” Badela said after their Nedbank Cup last-32 exit to the Buccaneers.
“He watches his games over and tries to improve all the time, so we’re helping him and with him staying beyond this season, it will have to be [a talk] between Pirates and All-Stars at the end of the season.
“Of course, we’d like to keep him if there’s a possibility, but if they feel that they need him, there’s nothing we can do but he’s one of the players we’re really proud of and doing very well at the moment, he and Baartman have been amazing for us at center-back.
Having lost 2-0 at Bidvest Stadium to the Soweto giants, Badela said it was a wake up call at the gulf in quality between the two professional divisions of South African football.
However, his players can take heart from their displays and take it into the rest of the Motsepe Foundation Championship, where they are fighting for promotion.
“It was a very good test to see how far we are as a team, we’re still new, we had to build a team from scratch this season,” Badela said.
“I don’t think we’re too far off, but the lessons we take from this game is when we get chances, even if it’s a half chance against quality opposition, we have to use it and then once you make silly mistakes in your half, they will punish you.
“So some of the mistakes we made, they scored, probably in our league you can get away with it in some games, but against quality opposition like Pirates, they will punish you. But I also thought there were times we weren’t brave, we sort of gave up.
“We didn’t want to press anymore and sort of went to damage control and I don’t like that, I want my team to express themselves on the pitch and never give up and keep trying – so that’s a little bit of a disappointment for me.”
All Stars are currently in sixth-place, nine points off the current league leaders Casric FC, with 13 rounds of fixtures remaining in the 2022/23 season.